Separation of Rural Land Ownership Rights, Contract Rights and Management Rights under the Subdivision of the Land Ownership System

Songjiang district proposed to "concentrate lands to farming masters" in the 1990s. At the beginning of this century it explored the management methods of transferring lands to big farming households, collective farms and other management subjects, and industrial and commercial capital land leasing, but the results were not satisfactory. As the farmers in Songjiang district were commonly secondary business operators, most large-scale farming households were migrants and itinerant farmers who needed to hire a large number of helpers in their management and faced the problem of unstable farmland management rights. Collective farms faced the problem of low enthusiasm and low efficiency in farming projects. Industrial and commercial capital land leasing faced the problem of guaranteeing the interests of farmers and the risk of farmland being used for non-agricultural purposes or for non-grain production. An important reason for the poor performance of these pilots was that the relationship between village collectives, contractors, farmland management subjects and cultivated land had not been properly defined in that the allocation of the various functions of farmlands had not been fully thought out.

On this issue, Songjiang district has explored an effective solution in the process of supporting the development of family farms, which became known as the Songjiang model. First, the farmland was uniformly transferred by the village collective economic organization, which could reduce the transaction costs and strictly limit the scope of land transfer to the inside of the village, thus reducing the risk of farmland disposal through the "acquaintance society". Second, it clearly defined the rent of farmland transfer, that is rice crops with an upper limit of 500 kg and a lower limit of 400 kg were converted into cash for payment to guarantee the interests of those transferring that land and those in receipt of it. It also established the family farm access standards and arranged village collective economic organizations and those transferring land to participate in the assessment and supervision of family farms to guarantee the benefits after the transfer. The Songjiang model separates the management rights of farmlands from the premise of guaranteeing the contractual management rights of the original farmers, and then concentrates the separated farmland management rights into the eligible household management subjects within the village collectives through the institutional arrangements and implementation of the collective economic organizations, thus forming family farms.

The Songjiang model clearly separates rural land ownership rights, contract rights and management rights, and makes reasonable allocations to those involved. The ownership of farmland is owned by the village collective, who can supervise and manage the farm operators according to the land transfer contracts and the family farm access requirements, has the right to collect the farmland transfer fee and serve as an agent to transfer the farmland, and also can terminate the transfer and resume the farmlands in certain circumstances. The land contracting rights are owned by the farmers. During the contracting period, the farmers can use the contracted land to engage in agricultural production and management, obtain paid exit income, transfer farmland and collect transfer fees, or return the land to the collective economic organization on a voluntary basis and with compensation during the contract period. In addition, farmers can also act as village representatives to participate in the decision-making process of the village collectives in terms of transferring farmland to farmers. The farmland management right is owned by family farm owners, who can operate, mortgage and inherit the farmland during the contract period. The village collective economic organizations shall not arbitrarily recover the farmland, and they can obtain the income from agricultural production and management and the national agricultural subsidies but cannot subcontract or sub-lease farmlands.

An important institutional core of the Songjiang model is to strip away the "membership rights" that are trapped in collective property rights, and present them in the form of farmland contract rights, so that the farmland management rights become a kind of property right that can get rid of the bondage of "membership rights" and hence provide an effective subdivision of the land right function structure and achieve a clear definition and mutual checks and balances among the rural land ownership rights, contract rights and management rights.

For more information, please contact WFP China COE (wfpcn.coe@wfp.org)